“I’m embarrassed about it, personally, for the Rangers, for my wife, my children and my family,” Hamilton said at his locker with a handful of his teammates joining the crowd of media that had formed. “It reinforces one of the things that I can’t have is alcohol. It’s unfortunate that it happened. I was out there getting ready for the season and took my focus off the number one factor in my recovery – my relationship with Christ. I hate that this happened…”I wasn’t mentally fit or spiritually fit,” he said. “It just crossed my mind ‘Can I have a drink?’ Obviously, I can’t. One drink leads to two and two drink leads to 10 or 12.

The pictures do not show Hamilton drinking, but he is definitely doing things with some young women that a married man should not be doing. If you click on each individual photo at Deadspin, you can read the story from the person that took the photos.

One caption…

The girls left. According to one patron, Hamilton, piss-drunk by that point, asked the manager where he could buy blow. The manager didn’t know. “Let’s go to a strip club,” Hamilton said. Someone drove Hamilton to Les Girls in Phoenix, Arizona.

Again, Hamilton is not seen drinking or doing drugs in any of these photos, but as the author noted, “would a sober Josh Hamilton agree to be photographed laying across the bar shirtless, covered in whip cream with his head between a random girl’s crotch?”

Since Hamilton was lost by the Rays in the Rule 5 Draft in 2007 and became an All-Star outfielder, many have ripped the Rays front office for giving up on the former #1 overall pick so easily. Others argued that no matter how good he is or how good he becomes, his life is always going to be one drink away from falling back into that very deep, and very dark hole.

Let’s hope for Josh’s sake that there is a very good explanation for this.

HERE is a second story via Deadspin in which Hamilton’s mentor responds to the allegations. Also, the Rangers will address the photos prior to today’s game.

Yep.
Instead of sitting in judgement, and droning on about how he screwed his family (allegedly), and potentially eventually his career, people should truly feel bad for his family and even more so for him because this is how the downward spiral perpetuates itself... you make a/another mistake, like falling off the wagon, and you've destroyed the lives of those you love, so you slide deeper into the abyss, then you've lost everything, and you have no reason to stop from chasing that rabbit down the hole for the rest of your life...

I agree 100%. They say when you're recovering from an addiction that a relapse is inevitable, but also a necessary step in the direction of full recovery. I've seen a lot of people go through this- some came out strong, others didn't. Let's hope it's the former for him.

Growing up with a functionally alcoholic father, I'm taking the idea that Hams "fell off the wagon" with a grain of salt. If this is true that this is an isolated incident, than this is hardly falling off the wagon. It's a HUGE error in judgement, a big mistake, and a disgusting display. But "falling off the wagon" to me is a prolonged use of alcohol, leading to the depth to where he once fell.

Well, that's why I said "may have.". My worry is what are the chances that the only incident happened to be caught on camera by somebody vindictive enough to send them to a big website. I HOPE for Josh's sake and his family's sake that this is indeed an isolated incident. But it is hard to give him the benefit of the doubt.

I did notice you said "may have" ... but my comment was more directed at the moron who said he wished the wagon backed over him.

According to the crawl on ESPN, he said he called his wife and the Rangers right after it happened. I know he's on a VERY short leash with the Rangers, and if he put another toe out of line after this incident, I'm sure he would have been dealt with severely. I can take that as a reason to believe his explanation.

I wonder if Hamilton can take Burell, Navarro, Upon and Pena with him on his next binder...because I seen him a home run last night and prob. many more to come before end of season (aga Rays?)
I would still give any thing for him to be playing RT. field the last two years...Philly would NOT have a World Series trophy now....I guarantee it!

First of all, you can't type. Second, how can you joke about something so serious? This man has a serious problem, and then you stupidly joke that other men should do the same thing, and they would somehow get better. You should probably think more before you type things on the Internet.